Players from near and afar playing jazz that sums up the music in these first years of its second century - that's what is on offer this weekend, and most of it is happening at the CBSO Centre in Berkley Street.

First the players from afar - from Poland, in fact.

Trumpeter Tomasz Stanko has been around for a long time, but has enjoyed a resurgence of interest in his cool, moody jazz since he took on three young Poles half his age as his band.

Marcin Wasilewski, Slawomir Kurkiewicz and Michal Miskiewicz on piano, bass and drums respectively, provide a dynamic and relatively sedate cushion for the founding father of modern jazz in Poland and a much more lyrical player than he was as a free jazz advocate in his younger days.

The band's two discs on the ECM label, Soul Of Things and Suspended Night, have picked up rave reviews, and their first performance here in February last year showed that they are equally fine - and a lot more fiery - in concert.

Pianist Wasilewski is clearly developing as a major player in European jazz and the trio now has its own album out, also on ECM.

They sound good on their own, but I think the real excitement is fired by the cross-generational interaction with Stanko, a highly individual musician who is continually searching for - and finding - new emotional depths in his music.

This Birmingham Jazz gig starts at 8pm and tickets are available from 0121 767 4050 of from the necgroup website.